


Riding to Autumn

by A_thousand_stars



Category: Stray Kids (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Medieval, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Gen, Summer, War
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-03
Updated: 2021-01-03
Packaged: 2021-03-13 21:54:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,613
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28535481
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/A_thousand_stars/pseuds/A_thousand_stars
Summary: Jisung has only known the wide open plains that he considers home. Throughout the years living and working on the land each of his family members has departed, looking or leaving for something else, eventually leaving Jisung alone. But even though he may be alone, he’s not lonely.Jisung’s only friend is Felix, a shopkeeper’s apprentice who lives in the nearby town. And even though Felix is always working in the village, and Jisung is laboring on the fields they have always remained close.One day Jisung and Felix receive a notice, one that will bring them far from home, to the edges of the world they wouldn’t ever dream of before. And suddenly this friendship seems on the verge of shattering. But as one link weakens, another strengthens, and Jisung has a second chance of finding his long lost brother, but it isn’t guaranteed.And as Jisung is left to piece back his life after it fell apart, he is left to decide, should he attempt to fix this failing friendship, or try to find his lost brother, while his life is in the grip of a summer storm.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 6





	Riding to Autumn

It was too bright. Jisung was only half awake when the sunlight came pounding through his eyelids, demanding him to get out of bed and start the day. Even if the blanket is thin and ratty, even if the mattress is stiff and scratchy, he refuses to move. The moment Jisung wakes up, he becomes so tired.

The moment Jisung wakes up, he’s so tired of the monotony of his work, the plainness of his home, and how life drags him from the bed to the field and back to the bed at a pace slower than the snails they pick off of crops.

But for whatever reason, he keeps on going. He likes to think it’s because he’s preserving the legacy of his lost family, being the only one left, on their ancestor’s land, but deep down Jisung knows it’s because he’s too afraid that one day, someone will come back, and he won’t be there.

When Jisung gets up he just lays the blanket back on his bed. He doesn't change clothes. His work clothes are his sleep clothes and his sleep clothes are his work clothes, and he doesn't have enough to keep them separate. He doesn't have enough money, or he doesn't have enough clothes, but probably both.

The fields are calling, and even with the sun just starting its arc across the sky it is blistering, it is burning, it is blazing. The heat can only rise. Both for the day, for the week, and for the month, until the season passes. In the flat, grass fields there is nothing to shelter people from the sun.

Sometimes when merchants come, they describe the plains as an ocean, but an ocean of land. When Jisung was younger he asked them what is an ocean, and they say it is like the plains, stretching far and wide, seemingly endless, but with water instead of grass. And when Jisung was a child he laughed at them. He has seen how water flows from his hands, how it splashes from their buckets when they are walking back from the well. He has seen the land slurp what little water drips upon it. How can there be such vast amounts of water without it leaving? Is there a bucket big enough to hold it? How does it not drain into oblivion? How does the summer sun not leave it bone dry and thirsty?

The merchants all laughed at him that time. They said that he’ll see if he ever goes east to the cities when he grows older, but the cities are so far away. It’s like traveling across an “ocean”.

But Jisung hasn’t really thought about leaving. This is home, and Jisung isn’t so upset about living here, staying here. But the merchants wouldn’t understand anything about settling down for home. Their home is their cart, their land is the ones they travel.

So far east that people in the city might think that winter is the season of endings and death, when it brings the unforgiving ice and its frozen harbors, the cold embrace of a traveling reaper, and the end of a year survived.

But for Jisung, he thinks summer is the season of death. Dried rivers and ponds, wildlife and livestock thirsting, the land parched and starving. Plants wilting as the sun's heat greedily turns what little water there is into vapor.

Winter is the season of new beginnings, of rebirth.

Spring is life, colors of nature bright and fresh.

Summer is death, the peak of an arch before the fall.

And autumn is the aftermath, the afterlife, the time after end and before start. When the trees in the orchards turn into brilliant colors and lose their leaves as if to mourn the dead. Leaves falling to bury them in beauty.

Perhaps that's why Jisung’s favorite season is autumn. The idea of after, of later, of life after death, a cycle ready to repeat. Would the trees burst into color and let go of their crown of leaves for him as well?

Jisung isn't scared of death. After all, winter is always trailing close behind.

He lives at the end of the road, and as he walks to the fields, practically every house is empty. As usual, Jisung is running late, but to him it doesn’t matter. He’s never too late where it becomes a problem.

There is a walk, past the field the farmers worked on yesterday, and past the grazing animals, and Jisung stops to pick up his tools and his baskets, ready to squander another day of his life to farmwork.

Today is the south field, the one farthest from his house, so it takes longer to get there, but Jisung savors the walk, the soft morning breeze, before the sun starts its relentless pounding heat.

Too soon he reaches the south field, and under the eye of the old man, Jisung takes a space, farther out than the others, and starts to work. He’s done this all his life, and Jisung easily finds a rhythm.

As the sun reaches its peak, and it seems too harsh to continue, the old man, too frail to work, calls break. All the tools hit the earth at once and everyone is scrambling to get out of the field, Jisung included. Ready to eat and ready to escape the sun, even if it is only for a short while.

The farmers go to a small town nearby, like their father before, and their fathers before. It is the most tiring walk, just a line of exhausted farmers tramping along a dirt path, too tired to talk, too tired to walk, but somehow, everyday they make it.

Waiting at the gate, as always, is Felix, Jisung’s only friend. The only person he holds close. Jisung’s mother had perished during famine several summers ago, his father had left north for a city for work, but never made it, his older sister had married to a traveling merchant, and escaped far to the west. His older brother had been drafted in the king’s army to fight war in the east. And Jisung is stuck in the plains and farms of the south alone.

Maybe the reason Felix and Jisung were so close together was because both of their blood families were far far away. Felix's mother and younger sister had died in famine. His brother was drafted as well and his father died in the field. Jisung remembered that day. Two summers before, hotter than it ever was. He just stood up, looked at the sun, and fell. Dead the moment he looked at the sky.

Closer than friends, perhaps like brothers. The only thing keeping them apart is that Felix got an apprenticeship at the general store, and Jisung is stuck in the fields. Felix will be a townsfolk, maybe be able to travel out farther to bigger towns, and Jisung is stuck as a farmer.

Jisung would be lying if he said he wasn't jealous of Felix. He was. Felix stayed in town, nice and dry under the general store's roof, while Jisung labored away outside rain or sun, in heat or freezing cold, unsure if the next day of work would be too hard to handle, and he would end up like Felix's dad. Felix has a future outside their tiny, dusty town, but Jisung is tied to the fields, as he has no other skills.

The moment Felix spots him, he goes running up to Jisung, a bottle of water in his hand. There is a bit of water that gets thrown over the edge as Felix runs, and is absorbed in as soon as it hits the parched ground. If it weren't for Felix, Jisung is pretty sure he would be dead, whether on the field or on the path to town. Whether it be from heat, thirst, or loneliness.

Felix waits as Jisung downs the water. It is a bit warm, from Felix holding it in the blazing sun waiting for him, and there is no way to get ice, without it melting, from the Great North into the plains of the south, especially in the summer.

Jisung is still grateful and gulps down the water. Warm water is better than no water.

Felix is bouncing on his heels, waiting for Jisung. He only does that when he has a story on the tip of his tongue, ready to burst out, and is waiting to say it. When he hands Felix back the cup, they start walking down to the general store. It is not far, just down at the end of the main path, the only path in town as plains towns are not big. The farms and orchards are.

“Jisung, Jisung, Jisung, you won’t believe what happened today,” Felix bursts out.

Jisung frowns. He assumed that Felix would sound a lot more excited for a break from the monotony of a small town in the middle of nowhere. He’s always more excited about stuff like this happening. Now that Jisung pays attention he sees that the bounce in Felix’s step is more nerves than excitement, the smile more strained than relaxed. What happened?

He looks over and studies Felix’s face, which still has Felix’s signature sunshine smile, but there was something else hiding too. Was it… fear?

“What happened?” Jisung attempts to ask nonchalantly, trying not to betray his bubbling curiosity and somewhat growing dread on what caused Felix to have such a weird reaction to a passing traveler. 

Maybe a criminal? Wild animal? A dried up well?

Felix looks nervously at Jisung. He swears he could hear Felix take a nervous gulp before answering, “A scout and surveyor came by the shop today.”

Jisung stopped straight in his tracks. They are nearly at the general store, almost right in front of it, but never has it felt so far away. It seemed like the world stretched and shrunk at the same time, a wave of dizziness setting in Jisung. The general store seemed more out of reach than Jisung on the path to town in the height of summer, after a hard morning of pure labor.

They stand there, Felix twisting his hair and hands as Jisung is unable to move from disbelief. A scout and surveyor? They would only come here for one reason. And that one reason isn’t a reason that Jisung particularly likes. Actually, a reason that Jisung despises and fears, and hoped would never come back, but has returned.

One Jisung finally regains the strength to open his mouth, he can only croak out one thing, “What?” His throat feels so dry, like Felix’s water had no effect, like it never existed.

The last time a surveyor and scout passed by their decrepit little town, it was to map out where all the tiny plains towns were, to collect farm boys and town boys and young men to be drafted and eventually fight and die for a king that doesn’t care for them. Last draft Felix and Jisung were just young enough to miss it, but their older brothers were taken. Now, several years later, Jisung and Felix are now the prime age to become soldiers, and they’re not slipping away this time.

It was inevitable they would be drafted. Summer is truly the season of death. Nothing screams for the reaper early more than war. Nothing leeches of the young and poor more than war. The marching miles in sagging armour in the summer’s heat. The swinging of swords, the firing of cannons, the nocking of an arrow, ready to soar. 

And, mostly, the festering, rotting flesh of people, cooking and bubbling in the sun, sprawled on the land, as flies flocking towards the dead and injured, ready to lay their eggs.

Jisung may wish to leave the farms and plains, but he doesn’t want to fight. Jisung may not be afraid of death, but he doesn’t want to die fighting a fight that isn’t his.

Jisung chokes out a laugh, but it comes out slightly hysterical. “Well, it was nice knowing you, Felix.”

Felix gives him a weird look. Clearly, right now isn’t the time for jokes.

They trudge into the general store. The empty room, one that Jisung and Felix had spent countless hours playing around before Jisung had to go out into the fields again. It had never looked so depressing, with its mostly empty shelves and crumbling walls. He drags his feet to behind the counter to where Felix would have stored his lunch, leaving Felix at the door.

“Do you think Park will get a new apprentice?”

Jisung looks back at Felix, who looks so hopeless. If he is already breaking from the thought of going to war, how is he going to handle the actual event? Jisung decides to tell Felix what he truthfully thinks. Better him shatter here, then shatter there.

Jisung glances up at Felix then down at his food. “Probably.”

At his words Felix collapses onto the ground whimpering, curled into a ball on the packed dirt floor. All Jisung can do is stand there and watch. It is sad and it is pathetic, but what more can two lonely boys do?

The time slowly passes them by in silence, and all Jisung does is sink deeper and deeper into his own thoughts. Some of them scare him. But it doesn’t matter as soon Jisung has to go back to the fields. But he doesn’t want to. All the energy he had before, this morning has drained out. What is the point? He’s going to be drafted and sent to a city far to the east. Probably never going to live to see this small, shanty town again. This small shanty town which Jisung has waited for even just one of his family to return.

The bell rings, signaling for all the farmers to get back to work. The ringing echoes through his ears, taunting. _Work until you die._

Through the windows at the front of the store, over the collapsed body of Felix, Jisung can see all the farmers exiting the buildings, ready to return now the heat has slightly died down, their bellies slightly more full. 

He hates this, he hates this so much.

Look at the window, look at Felix. Look at Felix, then look out the window. The crowd is almost gone, most have already gotten to the path. Jisung sucks in a breath.

Pushing his half-eaten food aside, Jisung gets up and grabs Felix by the shoulder.

“Well then, since we are so dead, let’s have some fun while we still can.”

* * *

The next few weeks seem to be eternal bliss. Jisung and Felix all day, every day. Counting down to their end.

They run out of town, they run down the path, to the farms, to the plains, to the orchards. They climbed up the trees and they could see miles and miles of grass. Sometimes they could imagine that they could see the mountain ranges of the west, jutting like teeth from the earth. Jisung pretends he can see his sister climbing those mountains.

Other days they look to the east, pretending that they could see the cities of metal and brick, with towers taller than the trees, and the vast ocean of endless water. 

Sometimes they look north, and pretend to spot the rivers and lakes that froze into glittering ice, where the ground is covered in soft, powdery snow, and where winter was eternal.

And on the rest of the days they look south, trying to see the trees that touch the sky, all crowded together. Where the flowers paint the ground in every color. And there are animals, animals that don’t look like anything that can come from this planet. Where it is hotter than the plains, but wetter than the plains.

From the rise of the sun to the rise of the moon they are together. Sometime Jisung and Felix sleep in Jisung’s home together, after staying out late in the farmlands, counting the stars in the midnight sky.

It doesn’t take long before the news of the scout and surveyor spread through the town and to the neighboring farms. Whenever Jisung and Felix return from running in the fields there is always someone who is pitying their smile and their joy.

_Poor children. Soon they won’t be smiling. Soon they won’t be breathing. Buried in the earth like the little boys before them._

Jisung makes a point to ignore them. He doesn’t need another reminder of his situation, the misery that will soon be hanging onto his every step. Or the misery he might cause with every step.

They would always run far from the general store, where Park made it obvious that he was looking for a new shop apprentice.

Summer may seem like life now, but it is slowly counting their final days away.

* * *

The sun decided to leave them that day. The sun left because it couldn’t bear to see them go, and instead, sent the clouds to cry for them. It perfectly represented Jisung’s emotions at the moment.

This one day, the town was not quiet. The farmers decided not to work today, so the crowd in the square was bustling. Jisung didn’t like how crowded it was, it made him feel nervous and a little trapped.

They came in the early morning, drums pounding, bells ringing. City folk with no sense of volume, screaming and shouting at the townspeople.

It was two people actually. A soldier and a scout. Jisung could tell it was a soldier by the way they held themselves. He was young, but he looked strong, stronger than Jisung, the farm boy. The farm boy who grew up lugging around sacks of crops and grain all day, everyday, until his limbs were numb. When the soldier talks, his voice is rough. Jisung can’t tell what he looks like, as half his face is shadowed under the hood of his cloak.

The scout just sits there behind him, sullen and silent, the way Jisung always thought scouts would sit. The scout’s face is also covered by the hood. He briefly wonders if the scout is the same one as before, but the thought quickly passes through his head. Jisung doesn’t really care for the answer.

When Jisung had arrived in the fields earlier that day, the old man was shouting at everyone to get to town. Jisung didn’t know why at the time, but he suspected. And he was right. Everyone left down the path early today. No work done.

When the “visitors” were satisfied with the amount of people standing in the square, they started waving a poster around. A list of boys they want, based on a census taken eight years ago. Back when his and Felix’s families were still alive. It also said the location they must report to. Time and date. Punishment.

Jisung doesn’t know how far the king would go to punish one runaway soldier, but he is too much of a coward to find out.

Once the soldier is done screaming in town he rides off, probably to the next town, taking the rain with him, horse hooves pounding into the dirt. The scout follows soon after, as quiet as the night. Jisung wonders if scouts get special horses that are as silent as them. Soon they are just the ghost of the wind.

At the exit of the city the crowd thins just the tiniest bit, and Jisung can see Felix at the edge, just standing there, defeated. Jisung doesn’t know what to do, so instead, he joins the crowd of farm boys gathered around the freshly hung poster.

Jisung spots his name right away. There aren’t a lot, as there aren't a lot of people here. A couple of names above Jisung is Felix’s. It was to be expected.

All the names on the list he recognizes. At the top is a boy that died two years ago from falling from an orchard tree. Almost at the end is a boy that ran down to the plains to play and never came back. Either he made it to the next town over, or the scavenger animals have picked his bones clean. Under Jisung is a man that chopped his finger off when he wasn’t paying attention to where the sickle was swinging.

In two weeks time they are to report to the Silver River, just outside the City of Jewels. It is far to the east, farther east than Jisung has ever dreamed of. It is past the plains, where dirt paths turn into paved roads, where dirt brick huts become buildings of wood, stone, and metal. Where empty farmland turns into bustling cities that turn into ocean that lead to places Jisung can’t even think of.

It is far to the east, and it is far from home.

The crowd has thinned considerably during the time Jisung stares at the poster. The group of boys have left, but Felix is still standing at the edge of the square. There is nothing else Jisung can do, he has stalled for long enough. Time to face Felix.

Despite everything they’ve been through, how close they are, these rescind days Jisung has been more and more unsure on how to comfort Felix. He feels like cracked glass. One wrong move and it can never be pieced back together. For forever they’ve been on the same page, sharing the same thoughts and feelings, but Jisung thinks this is the first time they’ve ever diverged.

Looking at Felix there is a tiniest wave of disdain and bitterness passing through Jisung. How can Felix act like this? Is he already so scared? Has his thoughts already consumed him? Is this his first reaction when something he doesn’t like happens? Is Felix really this… weak?

Jisung has already accepted his fate. Felix is still in disbelief. Jisung would say not to worry because the winter will always come again, but Felix doesn’t like winter. He’s the sun when he smiles, so why would he?

He’s dragging his feet, but he’s still walking to Felix. When he reaches him he opens his mouth to speak, but it’s dry and the words aren’t coming out. His mind is blank, but as he’s about to choke something out, Felix cuts him off.

“We’ll go tomorrow morning. I’ll get one of Park’s horses. Maybe you should pack or something,” Felix says as he walks away, his back turned towards Jisung. He turns back once, and Jisung finally sees his best friend.

Felix’s eyes are hard, his lips pressed thin. There is a stubbornness in his eyes, one that tells Jisung everything. Felix isn’t ready to die. He hasn’t accepted anything. He is not willing to even glance at autumn. Live suspended in spring.

Felix wants to survive. 

Felix wants to live.

And Jisung knows if one of them ever returns to this dead-end town, it won’t be him. He, who is too weak, is already preparing for death, and will do nothing about it.

He regrets his previous thoughts instantly. How could he be more wrong?

Felix has walked past the end of the main road, and is walking to the wide, open plains just outside of town, that, mere days ago, they both had been running to, happy, with no cares in the world.

Jisung starts walking, but he starts walking in the opposite direction, to the other end of town, to the dirt path that goes to the farms, and past the farms to the orchards, and climbs the tallest tree, higher than he has ever dared. Branches straining to carry his weight, snapping under him, but still, he climbs.

The plains are so wide and flat, Jisung swears he could see miles. The wind blows into his face and hair, and the grasses wave together. When Jisung closes his eyes and spreads his arms he almost feels like he’s flying. Like a bird who has only known freedom.

For one exhilarating moment, as Jisung lifts his hands, he wonders what would happen if the branches below him broke. Perhaps he could truly fly.

Jisung stays there for the rest of the day. He doesn’t meet Felix at the general store at noon like he always has for the past few years. He’s pretty sure that Felix isn’t waiting for him anyways.

Jisung finally moves from his perch as the sun is passing by the horizon and the sky is colors that can’t be found among the dirt and dried grass of the plains. Of home.

The route down is much more precarious than the route up, as a significant number of branches are missing from Jisung’s original venture up. He still manages to land safely on the ground. Maybe he should go home and pack now, like what Felix originally had told him.

By the time Jisung exits the fields and makes it to his little dirt shack at the end of the most northern field the sun has well beyond dipped away, the moon rising in place. Hopefully Felix has made it back safe. The plains are hard to navigate with nothing to guide you.

Looking around his one room, Jisung realizes there is not much to pack. He has a small leather bag that his father had made from some wild animal herd that had passed through several years ago. They don’t come by anymore. Jisung never had a reason to use it, so he never did.

There is a straw mattress and blanket pushed in the back corner, where Jisung would sleep one last time tonight. Along the front wall is just a line of buckets full of water from the nearest well, all stored up. In the middle is a little fire pit, with a pile of kindling near the door. It’s all dried grass, there is too much of that here. The only wood is from the trees in the orchards, a few short, stubby wild one scattered about, and the polished, cut logs carried by the traveling merchants that sometimes come.

He has looked over his little home over and over again, his bag lays empty at his side still.

Something glitters at the corner of his eye. Placed delicately, balanced precariously on a small clay bowl is a glass bead. When held up to the light it turns into a million glorious colors.

It was almost five years ago when the merchant caravan passed through. One of their horses was sick, so they had to stop by the town for longer than usual, and brought what merchant vans usually carry, spice and silk. Glass and wood.

Most of it is from the harbors and cities of the east going to the mountains to the west. From the west, they would bring metal and jewels to be sent to the harbors in the east, and the most direct path is through the plains. They sometimes bring trinkets for the people they meet on the journey, like wood and tree saplings. They also picked up crops to deliver to both the east and west.

The merchant caravan had stayed here for weeks, and there was a merchant's son there, and when he and Jisung’s sister met, Jisung could have sworn there were sparks between them. It was like one of those love stories from the books in their old bookshop. The bookshop that was left abandoned after the old bookkeeper had died.

When the horse got better the caravan immediately started to get ready to leave. They have already lost so much time here. The merchant’s son wanted to take Jisung’s sister with them to the mountains, and Jisung’s father agreed. It was one less mouth to feed. His father was left with Jisung and his older brother, Younghyun. Once Younghyun was old enough to live and work alone, Jisung’s father left to find work in the city. He died on the journey, or, at least, Jisung thinks he did, because he’s never heard of him since.

Jisung’s sister gave him and Younghyun a glass bead each, one that glittered when held up to the light. It rivaled the sunset, in Jisung’s opinion. When he was first leaving, Younghyun took his bead. Jisung supposes that he’s supposed to take his as well, as he follows the unknown fate of his older brother. The bead, a physical manifestation of what bonds that remain in their tattered family.

He wraps an old shirt of his, one that picked up one too many holes in it, around the bead and stuffs it in his bag, along with a few other pieces of stray clothing, but other than that, there wasn’t much else. He didn’t have many sentimental trinkets laying about.

That night he tosses and turns, his bed feeling more scratchy than ever. He wonders where Felix is. Is Felix sleeping cozy on top of the general store? Is he awake at the dead of night as well, thinking about Jisung, staring at the same moon? Or has he decided to take his chances in the plains?

* * *

At the break of dawn Jisung gets up. It is unlike him, but he cannot stand laying on that bed any longer, or his head might combust from stress.

On second thought, maybe that wasn’t a bad thing.

The air is still clinging to the last of the night breeze, when Jisung steps outside, with his bag strung up on his shoulder. The other farmers are just starting to leave for the fields now, but Jisung needs to head to town. He takes one look around his sagging hut framed by the morning sky, the dirt paths packed down from generations of farmers walking on it, and the retreating backs of his neighbors heading to work like they do everyday. Like Jisung used to do everyday.

The road to the farms is taken by the old, the ones that the king doesn’t want, the leftovers. Their bones have grown weak and weary from the years, but now they must work harder than ever, for the young have been marched off to foreign places.

This lowly house at the end of the road, that used to have a mother, father, daughter, and two sons sees the last of its family walking away for the final time. Left abandoned by the summer morning sky. Everyone has moved away, one by one, both by choice and by force, until none are left. And Jisung stands on its doorstep, taking one last look of what is home. A gentle breeze passes through and sends the stalks of grass waving goodbye.

When Jisung turns away he knows that he can’t look back, at this lonely house on the empty plains, or he might start running back to the only place he has ever known.

The path to town is deserted, and Jisung walks this dirt road alone. Stray pebbles crunch underneath his feet, and clouds of dust are kicked up behind him every moment at step is taken. It is not break time right now, every farmer has made it to the farmlands. He arrives and Felix is not waiting for him at the gate with a cup of water. His bag feels weird, an unfamiliar weight by his side, and keeps slapping him on the thigh as he walks.

There are other boys there too, getting ready to leave, crowded around each other. Some have their hands shaking as they get their horses ready, nearly on the verge of tears. Some are shouting about becoming a hero, a legend, written in stories. And Felix stands alone in a reclusive corner, a horse it tow. He neither shakes nor shouts.

When they meet they don’t say anything. Perhaps it is because they don’t need to say anything or perhaps they have nothing to say at all. A lot has changed, and Jisung is too scared to address them.

He’s busy anyways, as Felix ties up the last bundles filled with food and bottles of water and sheets of fabric to protect them from the rain. Everything they need to survive the travels through the wilderness. Felix’s hand is gripped around a shabby compass, one that has passed through one too many hands.

The mare stands tall right now, at the beginning of every journey, but soon she’ll be weighed down by the luggage and the two boys riding her. Soon she’ll barely be able to walk. Or maybe when they’re nearly at the City of Jewels, she’ll be unable to make one final push and pass from exhaustion and overwork.

And maybe Jisung and Felix will end up just like that mare.

He climbs up behind Felix, and they are the first ones out of town. As they charge forward, the grasses grow taller and stronger, more wild and untamed. The world opens up in front of Jisung, like a new story, a new chapter in his life.

In the midst of what feels like excitement, there is a sadness and longing in his chest. Of the house he left, on the land his family made. What if his sister passes by, only to find no one waiting. Jisung wonders if Felix misses town, if Felix longs for the days before. But Felix is only looking forward at the dusty road ahead, while Jisung looks back at their shrinking town disappearing behind them.

Felix urges the horse to ride faster, and during what seems to be the hottest morning of summer in the year so far, Jisung and Felix ride for the Silver River.


End file.
